Sunday, October 23, 2016

The Great Boston fire of 1872 was Boston's largest urban fire, and still ranks as one of the most costly fire-related property losses in American history. The conflagration began at 7:20 p.m. on November 9, 1872, in the basement of a commercial warehouse at 83-87 Summer Street. The fire was finally contained 12 hours later, after it had consumed about 65 acres of Boston's downtown, 776 buildings and much of the financial district, and caused $73.5 million in damage. Miraculously, only thirteen people died in the inferno.

Saturday, October 22, 2016

Here's a diverse set of photos from World War II, courtesy of Anti-Worlds.

A British soldier gives a defiant “V” sign to German POWs captured at the Second Battle of El Alamein during the Western Desert Campaign. Near El Alamein, Egypt. 26 October 1942
[that V sign also has another meaning in the British world, equivalent to the middle finger]

Australian soldiers of the 2/9th Light Anti-Aircraft Battery, Royal Australian Artillery position a Bofors 40 mm anti-aircraft/multi-purpose autocannon at a possible enemy Imperial Japanese plane during the Battle of Milne Bay, Papua, September 1942

British soldiers pose with a Bofors 40 mm anti-aircraft gun while defending Malta from Axis aerial attacks in the Mediterranean Theater of Operations. Valletta, Malta. 12 May 1942

Four unidentified American Doolittle Raid crewmen, who bailed out over China, are escorted through a Chinese village before being reunited with their unit. The Doolittle Raid was the first air raid by the United States to strike the Japanese Home Islands. Most of the crew members who bailed out over China, either crash landed, or were shot down by the Japanese. The assistance given by the Chinese to the airmen spurred the Japanese Imperial Army to carry out a retaliatory action called the Zhejiang-Jiangxi Campaign; over the course of four months, entire Chinese villages were destroyed, and an estimated 250,000 Chinese civilians were killed. Unknown village, China. 18 April 1942

Jewish children sit barefoot and in ragged clothing in

Nowolipie Street in the Warsaw Ghetto. May 1942

Jews in the Drohobych Ghetto are rounded by German troops

for deportation to Belzec extermination camp. November 1942

Maltese women go about their daily chores, washing laundry amidst

the rubble caused by Axis Italian and German bombing. April 1942

Most of the remaining Jews in the town of Hanau are rounded up and forced